, 1887-06-23
California and Oregon in History

cOvery OF gold III the Sacramento
valley revealed as in flash of aston
ishmeut the value Of our new natural
requirements, and introduced the
Pacific States" as 4 Few term into
the national vernacular. We shall
have to unite under one head with
OHr notice Of these volumes the ad-
mirab!e condensed History of Cali
fornia, contributed by Professor
Royce to the american Common
wealth Series edited by Horace
Scudder. Professor Royce takes
no pains to conceal his generous
admiration Of the work done by Mr..
Bancroft, and is probably only the
first in the long linc of coming his
torians who will reap the benefit Of
his researches and of his library of
Americana.
After some brief sketches of the
land, the people, and their previous
history, Mr. Royce makes his begin
ing with the preliminaries to the
United States conquest and Captain
Fremont's operations in connection
with the Bear Flag" conspiracy He,
therefore, starts at about the point
when Mr.. Bancroft'5 fourth volume
on California ends, and comes down
to the latest developments. With the
exception of tie introductory survey,
and the three years 1876 to 1875
his history covers period not yet
reached In Mr. Bancroft's voluminous
work.
Mr.. Bancroft naturally is at his
best III these later volumes. 1t is
difficult to characterize them They
are colossal endeavor to combine in
one work the cxtant libraries of infor-
nation, collections of living testimony,
Of original documents, annotated,
combined and put into order, with
the history proper which is their
Interpretation and which is woven Of
their web. They are not an attempt
TO write the history SO that it will
never be written again, or to say the
final word on all points, but to write
1t SO that whoever writes it again will
lind his best help in these volumes.
They constitute an opus of Il magnI-
tude which entities it to class by
itself and are going on with undimin
l5hed Vlgor, apparently unchecked by
the contiagratiOn which fell SO heavily
on the house of the Messrs. Bancroft
& Co, and worked such havoc among
the published editions ready for sale.
Mr.. BancrOft's private collections
for his historic works amount in man
uscripts and print to over $4,000 vol-
ume5. Portions of the ground covered
by him in his wide circle are, of course,
imperfectly illustrated in his own
library, and have required him to set
going explorations which have been
carried out on common ground with
other students IL the same depart
ments. Even in the California, Ore
gon and Alaska volumes he has not
limited himself to sources in his own
Immediate possession, but has pushed
his search out in all directions, under
taking journeys to confer with living
witnesses, or to make personal inspec
| ton of important manuscripts, and
! dispatching agents to collect for him
what he could not collect for himself,
and what other specially trained
students could examine better than
! he could.
1t is easy to see that in certain
definite and limited fields which have
been long under the scrutiny of
scholars, and where the original
materials are the common possession
of the entire Republic of Letters, this
plan is attended with inconveniences,
and will not produce result as salts
factory as might be expected from
the concentrated research of special
students of exceptional capacity. 1t
is also quite possible that the vast
body will never receive from his hand
of historic material contained in his
work the final Interpretation of per-
| fected history, and that much of it
must remain IN the condition of blocks
brought from the quarry, and await
ing the future genius who is to seize
the latent truth imbedded in them
and to bring it out But this avails
nothing against the immense positive
merit: of the work, particularly in
those portions that are now coming
| from the press.
The work is conducted Oh the plan
of collaboration, which, in some form
or other, is the only one which holds
out any prospect of completion in a
life time. 1t is plan which resembles
in many of its details that adopted
for the great English Dictionary of
the Pathological Society, but with
| this difference: that it is more closely
under the editors supervision, and
goes on the assumption that one
controlling mind is able to grasp.
digest and to work into historic form
| the vast body of material which others
have been emploeed to collect, arrange
and to sift for him. 1t is an open
question whether there is or is not a
fallacy in this assumption, and
whether better results might not be
obtained by allotting the work, and
going on the general principle that
the only mind which can weave the
fabric is the one which has acquired
the ability to do it in sorting the
wool, twisting and dyeing the threads.
However this may be, Mr.. Bancroft
| has carried Oh his work with degree
of ability and magnificent devotion
which has communicated his own
enthusiasm to his own collaborators,
and made it difficult, as we'll as an
ungracious, task to maintain the neg
atiye against his published results.
The work, as organized and carried
on under his eye, resembles that Of
some great department of State.
Whole libraries are searched. Col
lections that have required a life time
in the making of them are ransacked.
Every fact is noted, placed in its own
class, and laid up for future use; and
the result, as finally embodied in the
| finished volume, however far it may
depart. in some respects, from that
terse, judicial and irresistibly fascin
ating history of which Thucydides is
the type, is one which makes the
students of his pages historians in